Book Review

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The Inner game of tennis by Timothy Gallwey

December 31, 2018

This book was written in 1970s by Timothy Gallwey who at the
time was a tennis coach and amateur tennis player. The book was written as a
manual for tennis players to improve their game. But it has found widespread
applicability outside of tennis and even outside of sports to areas as diverse
as music, business, writing etc.

Think about a person you admire who is an expert in their
field. What are the qualities you think set them apart from others? One obvious
quality is that they have better skills in their chosen field. But the thesis
of this book is that there is something else apart from the visible aspects
that is important to get ahead. Whenever we are trying to learn anything new;
there are two types of games – an outer game and an inner game. The outer game
is all about the tricks of the trade and the physical aspect of the game
including skills. The inner game is about the mental aspect of the game and is
equally important if not more important than the outer game.

What really is the inner game? We encounter a mental voice
frequently in our life. The voice prevents us in general from learning new
things and having new experiences. Lets say we want to learn to play guitar. The
voice may tell you that we are too old to learn guitar. Or it may say that you
will not have the time to learn or it may give any of the thousands of other
excuses for us not to even start. Another example – lets say you want to take a
solo trip and are thinking the idea over in your head. The voice may ask you
that what would happen if you don’t like it and would then be stuck there all
alone. The voice always has these practical sounding but ultimately ridiculous observations
and comments.

Sportsmen also suffer from this voice inside their head. It
can be critical and distracting and it prevents them from playing their natural
game. In 2006, Delhi was playing Karnataka in a Ranji Trophy match. Karnataka
put up a score of 446 in their first innings. Delhi while chasing quickly lost
5 wickets and that is when Virat Kohli came in to bat. He stabilized the
innings and by the end of the day Delhi were 103 for loss of 5 wickets and
Kohli was not out at 40. When Kohli went home that day, unfortunately his
father passed away at 3am in the night. Obviously, everyone assumed that he
would not come in for play the next day. Hence, his coach and teammates were
shocked to see him in the dressing room ready to bat the next morning. Not only
did he show up, he went on to make 90 runs and saved Delhi from a follow on. Can
we imagine what Kohli must be going through when he was playing that innings.
First, there was intense pressure of the match given that Delhi had lost 5
wickets and were chasing a mammoth target. But secondly, he was also dealing
with this terrible tragedy. I can imagine his inner voice going berserk
thinking about the funeral, which must have been scheduled for that day. He may
be wondering about his family and how they are coping with this tragedy. But
despite all this, Kohli was able to play a terrific inning. This shows that he
has a strong inner game. He was able to suppress / ignore his inner voice and was
able to focus on his game for the duration of the play.

We all struggle with this inner voice in various areas of
our life. How can we improve our inner game? We can do that by suppressing this
inner voice and trusting oneself more.

Suppressing the inner voice. One way of doing this is
persistence. We already know that learning anything worthwhile is going to take
time. If we want to get in shape, we know that going to the gym can be helpful.
But for the first few months, we will have to do all the hard work and there
will be no visible results. The results will take 6 months to a year to show. In
the meanwhile, we may feel that we should quit because nothing is happening. At
such time, we have to ignore that voice and push through knowing that results
will come in time. The second way to quiet the inner voice is through focus. This
means that we should focus our mind on specific aspects of the game so that the
mind does not get a chance to create any distractions. For example, one of the
tricks which is used by tennis players is watching the ball when they are
playing. Because they are so intensely focused on the ball and its trajectory, their
mind does not get a chance to create any distracting thoughts.

Trusting oneself. We need to understand that there is a
child within all of us. It is the child who is eternally curious and wants to
explore new things and have new experiences. Let us call this our authentic
self. It has natural ability to learn new things – whether it be a sport like
tennis or learning a new language or learning to play guitar. Now as we have
seen, the inner voice interferes and distracts us. This interference, although
well intended leads to deterioration in our natural performance. Over time it
can lead to our authentic self taking a back seat. When this happens, we will find
it difficult to step out of our comfort zone. We may shut down from new
experiences and loath to taking any risks in life. We need to give more power
and autonomy to our authentic self. We need to trust ourself and our natural
ability to learn new things.

In conclusion, I found the book does highlight a very
important topic of inner game which is very important in all aspects of life. I
felt that the book did an excellent job of explaining the inner game. But it
fell short on my expectations on offering solutions to getting better at the
inner game. The solutions offered in the book are applicable to the game of
tennis. And given that this book is titled “The inner game of tennis”, I’m not
sure if that is a valid criticism.